The Genealogy Squad’s Newest Member

Announcements,

I’m taking a short break from my Box Adventures series for a couple of reasons. First, my scanning assistant has been studying and taking her AP tests recently so not much progress has been made on the scanning front. Also, I ordered some archival materials, but since they are shipped out of New York, and New York is in lockdown, they aren’t shipping right now. So I will wait until some of those things clear up to finish that blog series.

In other exciting news, I was asked to join one of the largest (over 33,000 members and growing!) and highest-quality genealogy groups on Facebook, The Genealogy Squad. It was started a year ago by several of my colleagues with the idea of giving good, solid, accurate information when it comes to genealogy. Of course I said yes! How could I resist working with some of my favorite people? Drew Smith and George Morgan of the Genealogy Guys podcast and Cyndi Ingle of Cyndi’s List are the other administrators. We also have some fun moderators working with us as well.

“The mission of The Genealogy Squad Facebook group is to provide a positive space for the sharing of appropriate and reliable methods and resources to assist genealogists at all levels. We focus on answering questions and solving problems, while demonstrating best practices in all aspects of genealogical research.”

If you’d like to join, click here. There are some rules to read and follow, and some questions to answer so we know you are not a spammer. We try to keep the group drama-free, positive, and educational so the items in the rules are important and are there for reasons they’ve figured out over the life of the group.

I’m so excited to have been included. Please join the group if you haven’t done so already!

 

Box Adventures: Who Are These People?

Family Artifacts and Photos

Box Adventures_ Who Are These People?

Do you have photos like these?

When I was young, my family was very fond of having large get-togethers where we all shared potluck meals and grilled hotdogs and hamburgers. I love a good potluck and I blame it on my upbringing. Where else will you get sweet and sour baked beans, onion casserole, and Jell-o salad on the same plate?

Invariably, at these parties, we would have a very large group picture. And just as invariably, those pictures ended up in an envelope full of all of the developed photos from that film roll (remember those?) and be stored in a box. That box would later be discovered by me and not know who most of the people are in the pictures!

It’s sad on some levels. Who are these people? What role did they play in the lives of my family? Who were they that they got invited to the party? I can identify the major players, me and my parents, my aunt, and her family, my grandparents, some of the really close friends of the family. But then there are the others. The fringe folk as it were. Those who came and went. They were in our lives for a short time. Who were they? I may never find out. My aunt may know some of them. But some of their identities are lost to the ages.

If you have living family members that can identify those in the photos, be asking them now. Make notes on the back or in some way that they don’t get lost from the photo. But for many of these people, it’s too late. For those, I look at these party photos and remember when we were all together. I don’t just mean prior to COVID-19, but also because many of the people in the photos have died. And miss many of them terribly.

When you are a kid you don’t appreciate what you have in your family and family friends. Then when you get old enough to appreciate them, they are gone or going. As I get older and as more of my older family members pass on, I deeply wish that I had paid more attention, that I appreciated more. Mostly, I wish I could turn back the clock and chat with my grandparents again. Ask them the really important questions. (I always think “what would grandma or grandpa think about this?”) Be at one of those potlucks again.

I hope you can answer “who are these people?” with your photos.

Box Adventures: Titling Photos

Family Artifacts and Photos, , ,

Copy of Box Adventures_ Titling photos-2

If you have read this Box series since the beginning, you know the size and scope of the photos I received ten years ago. It was a huge box with rather random photos and papers included. My daughter has been doing the scanning. We’ve been doing the titling together. Luckily, when I picked up the photos ten years ago, I managed to ask my grandma or aunt who certain people were and made notes. So they aren’t all completely unidentified.

If you undertake a project like this, you will likely develop your own system and methods. Do what works best for you and makes the most sense with your filing system. Ours goes like this:

  • My daughter, Ellie, scans an image. She asks me who about the image if there are no notes. If there are notes, she can figure out the title.
  • She titles the images along the lines of “surname-firstname-event or number-year” so that it might be “Dimick-Leland-1” or “Kindervater-Ernestine-Wedding-1895.” If we don’t know one of the elements (such as the year) then we just leave it off. These might change after I do some of the research, but for now, they are titled in a way that lets me know what is in the file.
  • She uploads the images to a shared Google Drive folder.
  • Later, I download the scanned images to my hard drive to the folders where I keep all of my family history photos.

The Google Drive looks like this:

Box-GoogleDrive

The eagle-eyed among you might notice a difference in file types. We had settings set up for .tif (my preferred file for photos). However, when we moved to a new scanner, we didn’t get the file type set for some of the photos and didn’t notice until she had done many. We decided not to redo all of those .jpg files for now. Someday we might go back to it. But for now, the images are digitized as well as in an archival box and that’s good enough for me.

Those digitized photos will sit in the Google Drive for a while. I have not decided if I will leave them there. My hard drive gets backed up to a cloud backup server, so I don’t feel the need to duplicate them in another location. However, I will leave them there until I get my filing done on my hard drive…just in case.

Mainly, when tackling a large project like this, figuring out a system and sticking to it is the most important. Then it’s just a matter of hiring a teenager to do the repetitive tasks. If you don’t have a teenager you can hire, especially in these times of social distancing, the task of scanning and titling your photos is not difficult.

Put on a movie or audio book or music and get scanning!

Box Adventures: Remembering Aunt Pinky

Family Artifacts and Photos, , ,

Box Adventures_ Remembering Aunt Pinky

In the midst of all of the pandemic and in my unpacking and scanning photos from the box I shipped to myself 10 years ago, my family lost one of my favorite great-aunts, Helen “Pinky” Dimick. She was married to my uncle Richard “Dick” Dimick, my grandma’s brother. She died on Saturday morning, April 18. (Click here for her obituary.)

My family was a little bit divided, geographically. My parents were divorced, and my mom moved us to Wyoming just before I started high school. Whenever we visited our Ohio family, there would be pot luck meals where family and friends came to see us and Dick and Pinky were always among the visitors. Pinky was always smiling, always interested in what we were doing, asked a lot of questions about how we were doing in school or work.

My grandma, Pinky, and their friend Wilma came to visit us in Colorado in February 2007. They seemed to have a ball entertaining (or being entertained by) my kids.

Pinky watching my son play cards.
My daughter, Pinky, my grandma, Ethan, and Wilma

Pinky was always a good friend and companion to my grandmother and I’m happy my grandma had friends and family around her after my grandpa died.

Pinky recently celebrated her 92nd birthday. She was happy, healthy, and smiling having87954060_1508407732656862_4069401562143784960_n dinner out with her family. She lived a long and happy life and I was so fortunate to have had her as part of our family. Her kindness, pleasantness, and cheerful personality will always be the thing I remember most about her.

Rest well, Pinky. Say hi to grandma, grandpa, and dad for me!

(Pinky enjoying her 92nd birthday dessert in February 2020. Photo by Sue Dimick-Dauer.)

Box Adventures: Get the Right Tools

Family Artifacts and Photos, , , ,

Copy of Box Adventures_ Sorting and PlanningWe unpacked the box and sorted it into types of items. I then hired my daughter to do the scanning for me. We discovered my old scanner was just not working fast enough. A job that should take a small amount of time was taking forever. Since I’m paying her by the hour, and she was getting completely bored waiting for the scanner to do its thing, I decided to upgrade my scanner. My old scanner was a built-in scanner, copier, printer. In computer years, it was old. It still works, mind you, but it is slow. So, the need for speed got me shopping.

ScannerI opted for an Epson Perfection V600 photo scanner. It has some features I need for a price I was willing to pay. You can find it on Amazon here. I am not here to tell you this is the best scanner ever and the one you should order. That’s not what this blog is about. This is the scanner that had the features I needed at a price I was willing to pay. And it has worked out great. It scans faster, the images are turning out great, and my daughter is finding the software easier to use.

So, in between online class zoom meetings, school work, and her private flute lesson over Skype, my daughter has been scanning away and finding some great little tidbits. Here are just two, I’ll share more in the future:

Miller_Cari_NP-1976 Flag Day

 

 

 

 

This is me, little Cari Ann Miller in 1976, the bicentennial. I wore a stars-and-stripes covered outfit, undoubtedly handmade by one of my grandmothers, and was caught waving my flag at the town parade. We lived in a little town called Weston in Wood County, Ohio. This clipping does not have any date of the newspaper but this was most likely published in the Daily Sentinel-Tribune out of Bowling Green.

 

 

Miller_Kenny_NP-Fireman of the Year

And this is one of my dad who was a volunteer fireman in Weston. Apparently, he was named Fireman of the Year one year and then passed off the honor to another man the next year. Again, no dates were written on these clippings but this would have been sometime prior to 1980.

 

Stay tuned for more Box Adventures. I will post some of the delights that I find as we move through the process of unpacking the old photographs, newspaper clippings, slides, artifacts, and more!

Box Adventures: Sorting and Planning

Family Artifacts and Photos, , , ,

Box Adventures_ Sorting and Planning

Ok, so I’ve unpacked my box. It was jam-packed full of treasures that will take me months to sort through. I’m excited. So what to do first? Honestly, I have no idea…but here is what my preliminary plan is.

Step 1: Sort into types of items

Largely, there are photographs here. Some of them, I know I already have digital copies of from a time back when I was allowed to scan them, but not keep them (before the downsizing). There are also newspaper clippings as well as full newspapers. I will need to figure out why that newspaper was kept and perhaps clip out the important part (keeping the title, date, page, column for the citation, of course). There are large family reunion photo prints that have been rolled up. There are envelopes with who knows what inside. So sorting is my current project.

Step 2: Decide how to preserve each type of item

I could scan, photograph, frame, clip, store in archival boxes, and so on. Each item is going to have a different solution. Determining that solution will be next and I’ll tackle each item separately. For example, I probably don’t need to keep the actual newspaper or clipping if I get a good scan of them. Newsprint is terribly acidic and doesn’t hold up well over time. But if I make a scan and print on archival paper, it might last longer. Making each of these determinations is going to vary.

Step 3: Do the task set forth in step 2 for each item

This step could take months. The process of scanning and putting the item into whatever the final form will be is going to be lengthy. And I think one I can hire my teenaged daughter to help with since she’s home right now.

Step 4: Catalog each item

Putting the information into my family tree software, the digital image stored in my digital filing system, and a copy stored in my binder system will likely come at the end. And this is going to be the fun part! My initial thought is that my daughter can scan the item and name them in a pre-determined format then put them in a dropbox folder we share. Then one-by-one I can go through them and put them in their appropriate places. It is during this step that I will also craft the citations for each item.

Up next…getting into the sorting. I hope my daughter is ready!

Mastering Genealogical Proof Class forming

Genealogy Program

As planned, a new class is opening this summer on Mastering Genealogical Proof. This will be a seven-Week Beginning Principles Course taking place on Wednesday Evenings (7pm Central) June 3rd through July 15. This is for those who have never studied this book before. We will be studying this from a beginner or slightly intermediate level. If you’ve done one of these groups before and want a refresher, that’s ok too! I will take 25 students.

Sign up here

I am still in the planning stages of the documentation class for the fall. And maybe starting a writer’s group but am still trying to decide how that one will work most effectively. You can sign up for early notification on either of those here: https://genealogypants.com/research-and-consultation-services/classes-and-study-groups/

Box Adventures: Getting it Out of the Closet

Family Artifacts and Photos

Box Adventures_ Closet

IMG_5089

See the box in this photo? I shipped it to myself in 2010. That’s what the label says. Can it really have been 10 years? Ten years ago, my grandmother decided to downsize her home (after already downsizing from a large farm several years prior) and move into a small apartment. She was not able to keep up with the yard and housework anymore. A large garage sale would take place and a dumpster may have been mentioned. I got on a plane.

In fact, I sent four boxes home. Items were delivered to a pack-n-ship where they very carefully wrapped everything and got it ready for the cross country journey from Ohio to Colorado. I’m happy to add that nothing was broken! Three of the boxes were dishes or other things that used to belong to my great grandmother (whom I’m named after). But this one box is FULL of papers, photos, and I cannot remember what else because even though I packed the box, it has been ten years. And within those ten years, my family moved from Colorado to Texas. So… this is LONG overdue.

You don’t have any projects like that sitting around, do you? Surely not. I’m the only bad, bad genealogist out there.

Well, I’ll be unpacking the box over the next couple of weeks and scanning, sorting, and storing in archival boxes. (I have a couple I bought TEN years ago for this project!) I’ll share some of the cool treasures I find along the way. I hope you get out a scanning project or two you have tucked away and join me!

Writing: Tips on the Rough Draft

Genealogy Writing Tips,

Tips for Rough DraftWhen getting started on the writing, you might feel overwhelmed. Where do I begin? What should come first? How do I build this story so that it is clear, concise, easy to understand, and makes the case?

Consider this: try writing BEFORE you finished the research. Maybe even at the outset or early-to-middle stages of your research. When you’ve determined you have a tougher problem on your hands maybe? Start the writing then.

Start writing when you start the research. It can go like this:

  • Research…discover you don’t have a straightforward problem.
  • Write a research plan which starts with a clear and concise research question.
  • As you research, you add to that document your findings, conclusions, analysis, summations, and add to the plan.
  • Eventually that same document (or I like to make a copy to work from) can become your rough draft.
  • Edit, rearrange, add, delete, and discover more research to be done.
  • And as they say, “rinse and repeat” until you get a good solid third, fourth, fifth, sixth draft.

Tip: Keep a copy of each draft. If you’re like me, you’ll change your mind about something and wish you had an earlier copy to refer back to.

Whether you write before you think you’re finished or at the end of your research, you will find “holes” or things you didn’t consider when you begin writing it all out. This is good. And this is why I try to start writing before I get too far along in the research. It helps my research stay focused, and points those holes out to me sooner rather than later.

This rough draft stage can and should go through many versions. In this stage consider:

  • The rough draft should not be “pretty.” It should be quite ugly, actually. The uglier the better. Let it be as ugly as possible, then you’ll know you are doing it right!
  • DO NOT EDIT yourself, the writing, get out the Chicago Manual Of Style, or anything like that at this stage. Keep the errors, typos, misspellings, etc.
  • DO NOT worry about citation formats at this stage. If you don’t have the citation written already, do not worry about it when doing this part. Put a placeholder footnote in so you know where you need to add the citations later.

Worry about editing, errors, typos, style, citations, and all of that will only slow you down and deter you. Don’t do it! My rough drafts begin with a lot of bullet points that can easily be made into full sentences later. I tend to repeat myself, use the wrong their, there, or they’re, put in too many commas or not enough. DO NOT WORRY ABOUT IT! That is what the editing phase is for when you think you’re nearly done with the bones of the writing.

Get some writing done! There’s no time like the present…seriously.

Writing: Be Organized with Your Words

Genealogy Writing Tips, , ,

Be Organized With Your Words-2I like to write in “bits.” By ‘bits’ I mean short thoughts, a couple of paragraphs on one idea, or a page at a time. My ‘bits’ can be found everywhere: notebooks, margins, on my phone in the notes app, in emails or texts to myself, slips of paper on my desk, sticky notes sticking to all kinds of things, in Evernote, and in other places. This is not very organized! Unfortunately, many writers that I’ve talked to are like this. When an idea hits you, you have to take a moment to write it down wherever you can.

How do you manage all of those ‘bits’? Here are some ideas I’ve developed over the years:

  • Keep a notebook on your desk. I have a notebook that I use as a holder for my writing ideas of whatever kind. I prefer paper most of the time. I find it easier to jot my ideas down rather than finding my phone, opening an app, being clutzy with the typing and dealing with autocorrect, and so on.
  • Evernote. I already use it a lot for research notes. This one is easy for the mobile aspect of note-keeping. I may not always have my notebook, but I’m rarely without my phone. Now, instead of texting myself or emailing myself or using the notes app, I try to put thoughts into my Evernote app in a folder called “writing ideas” if it is a general idea, or in a particular folder if it has something to do with something I’m already working on. And if you aren’t an Evernote user, use your software/app of choice.
  • Use timelines and tables. When working on certain research projects, especially trying to determine if I’m working with one man or two (or more), timelines and tables can be helpful in organizing the evidence I’ve found and then make a reasonable determination.
  • Use note cards. Yep. I said it. Use that old-school item, the 3×5 notecard. I use them when I’m working on how to organize my evidence items. They help me decide when to introduce a new evidence item, concept, or individual when working on a larger writing project such as a case study.

When you accumulate a lot of ‘bits’ you need to do something with them to keep them organized. Some of the above might work for you, or you may find another system that speaks to your way of doing things. However you do it, your system should help you keep your ‘bits’ in a logical order, contained (to avoid tangents), and on topic or theme.

I find that over time, that I can take those ‘bits’ and put them into a larger writing piece. And nothing is better than getting a larger writing piece put together!